Someone asked me recently how I got into photography. Well, I guess that's a good question.
One day back in 2005, I was sitting at my desk at work surfing the internet. I stumbled across some 80's movie trivia website, and it had a page about the movie "The Blues Brothers." It had a list of trivia facts about the movie, and one of those facts stated that the iconic mall chase scene was filmed at a now-abandoned mall in Harvey, Illinois. It also stated that it was still standing. It had a link to a website called deadmalls.com which had photographs of the mall. And from the moment I viewed those photos, it changed the way I viewed the world. In a very short amount of time, I became obsessed with Dixie Square Mall. I made my first trip to the mall with a friend of mine and my brother in May 2005, and I am pretty sure that this is the first photo I ever took there. Now, nearly 4 years later and over a dozen trips out here, I have hundreds of photos of this place.
But ever since my first visit to Dixie Square, a passion was born - my passion for photography. I started out taking a lot of pictures of abandoned buildings. From abandoned shopping malls, to abandoned Jewel stores, I explored it all. Over the years, my love of trains has come through in my photography. I am also starting to do more portraits. In the last 4 years, my photography has grown in leaps and bounds. And to think.... it all started with an abandoned shopping mall.
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